Building Ethical Makerspaces: Preventing Corruption in Community-Driven Non-Profit Organizations
Strategies for Ensuring Fair Elections and Promoting Transparency and Accountability
Community-driven makerspaces have the potential to foster creativity and collaboration, but without strong ethical leadership, they can become mired in corruption and abuse of power. In this article, we explore strategies for preventing corruption in volunteer-driven non-profit makerspaces.
Community-driven makerspaces that are run entirely by volunteers can face a number of challenges when it comes to managing elections and preventing corruption. One key issue is the risk of triangulation, where different factions of the membership may seek to manipulate the voting process to advance their own interests.
To prevent triangulation, it is important for makerspaces to establish clear guidelines for how elections are managed. This may include establishing a nominating committee that is responsible for identifying and vetting candidates, creating a transparent and fair process for voting, and setting term limits for leaders to prevent the consolidation of power.
In addition, makerspaces can also take steps to promote transparency and accountability in the election process…
